‘My baby shows that life goes on after a kidney transplant’
A GUERNSEY woman thought to be the first to give birth after having a kidney transplant said her experience showed the benefits of organ donation and how life could go on afterwards.
Samantha Flouquet, 28, suffered kidney failure in 2015.
After feeling ill in May that year, she said did not go to the doctor immediately, but when she attended eventually and the doctor noted her blood pressure, she was rushed to hospital and placed in the intensive care unit.
‘The same day I was air-lifted to Guy’s Hospital in London and they did a biopsy and I ended up on dialysis.’
While she was found to have an infection, she said doctors could not understand why her immune system ended up attacking her kidneys.
She was placed on peritoneal dialysis, which meant she was able to have it at home and from June onwards she underwent four treatments a day.
The only long-term answer for her was to receive a kidney transplant.
‘I was placed on the deceased donors’ list so it was a case of waiting for a donor to come up,’ she said.
But at the end of September doctors had bad news.
‘I was told that I wasn’t responding to the dialysis and it wasn’t looking great.’
Efforts to find any donor were also proving fruitless, with none of Miss Flouquet’s family a match.
Then her mother had a conversation with a woman at work, who turned out to be a match and offered to provide one of her kidneys.
The operation was a success and afterwards Miss Flouquet said she started to think about the future.
‘Before I fell ill I’d not really known if I wanted children.
‘But when they did my transplant they said they wanted me to have children before I was 30 so that I was in as good health as I could be.
‘I didn’t want to regret not having children, so I decided to have a baby.’
She said that while it was not unknown for kidney transplant recipients to have children, she was told that she was the first Guernsey patient to do so.
Because of her condition she was taken to the UK for the birth when she was at 34 weeks, going to St Thomas’ Hospital in London.
Her mother was able to stay with her throughout and her partner, Courtney Loveridge, was able to visit every weekend and be present for the birth thanks to a contribution from the Helping Jonah, Helping Others charity.
‘And the Guernsey Kidney Patient Association helped me with the cost of accommodation,’ she said.
Baby Theodore Loveridge arrived without any complications at 38 weeks.
Miss Flouquet said that because she was the first in the island to give birth after having a kidney transplant she wanted to tell others about how donating a kidney can benefit others.
‘A lot of people didn’t realise you could live with just one kidney and they didn’t know you can donate to someone who’s not in your family – you can donate to anyone.’
